A long, long time ago in the ancient Macedonian hillside village of Skopje lived a young woman named Mykos. Mykos was a twenty year old woman who lived by herself in a small empty hut by a river in the forest surrounding the village. Mykos was a very clever and very poor woman. She liked to travel the quiet waters of the river and listen to the distinct sounds of the forest birds. Even though she was always alone, the local villagers knew of Mykos’s story. She had a facinating background and was one of those people that was forseen to a life of poverty and seclusion. Mykos’s family was originally from a small town in Serbia where she grew up when she was little. Mykos had ten sisters and one brother. Unfortunately when Mykos was born nine of them died, and the other two moved to another village in Serbia that no one had ever heard of.
When Mykos was five years old she wanted a frog, so she climbed one of the trees in her backyard to find the leaping frog. Sadly, the frog was a hungry owl that bit her left ear in half leaving her partly deaf. When Mykos was eleven years old she went to a local dance with her friends. There no one danced with her, and she was left with a complex that left her afraid of intimacy and love. When she was sixteen years old, the nun in her church offered her the opportunity of chastity and devotion, but her parents did not approve of this path so once again she was left alone. At the age of nineteen she moved away from her parents, and traveled to Skopje where she adopted a similar life of seclusion and loneliness. What Mykos did not know was that before her birth her mother, Vladja, went to an old sorceress in the village that told her she was with child. Vladja echoed a poem, “ All these trinkets, toys, trifles, souvenirs, small mementoes or great moments, small presents from great friends, one day they’ll lose their magic attraction, their small warm souls, to turn into cold bits and pieces. Maybe the elm which has begun to die now similarly feels that it bears a lot of withered branches.” In ancient Macedonia, the birth of a child always begins with two poems that determine the childs fate. Then, the sorceress recited another poem. “ You who will stand on Gazibaba, my descendant hear me: from here I too have gazed on Skopje, it was a spring day, one of those when the fresh outlines of the roods are softly interwoven and every poplar is a green waterjet. My gaze is a little veiled (that’s why I’m silent) but clear sighted and bright. Know you: I feel that this call is the boldest grasp for the future, an embrace of your sould, I’d say, and cutting like a fresh-hones edge, dreaming, teeming, screaming: remember me!” So scared now, Vladja ran away home to her husband, only to tell them that their child was doomed to a life of sadness and uncertainty. While tempted to leave the child at birth, she loved the thought of having her own child. What the old sorceress did not tell Vladja that day, was that while Mykos was doomed to a life of sadness she would have one great love. This great love would be her own child.
So one day, Mykos who had a strange feeling on that particular hour went to another village sorceress who echoed to her a much different poem. She said sweetly, “ I was perhaps not quite twenty when I wrote: So much did woe cry out within me that I was born into a tribe in need. And to this day the injury will bleed. I’m haunted by that ever-present woe and one that’s greater still so that, sower of barren seed, I’ll say, to change the words a little, still does the woe cry out within me that I am horn into a tribe in need. And yet I hope this isn’t so, since I have undergone the test of such great woe.” That day, Mykos overjoyed with this news ran by the river in Skopje and gave birth to a little girl named Miklos. Little did Mykos know, Miklos meant “queen”, her true destiny all along.
When Mykos was five years old she wanted a frog, so she climbed one of the trees in her backyard to find the leaping frog. Sadly, the frog was a hungry owl that bit her left ear in half leaving her partly deaf. When Mykos was eleven years old she went to a local dance with her friends. There no one danced with her, and she was left with a complex that left her afraid of intimacy and love. When she was sixteen years old, the nun in her church offered her the opportunity of chastity and devotion, but her parents did not approve of this path so once again she was left alone. At the age of nineteen she moved away from her parents, and traveled to Skopje where she adopted a similar life of seclusion and loneliness. What Mykos did not know was that before her birth her mother, Vladja, went to an old sorceress in the village that told her she was with child. Vladja echoed a poem, “ All these trinkets, toys, trifles, souvenirs, small mementoes or great moments, small presents from great friends, one day they’ll lose their magic attraction, their small warm souls, to turn into cold bits and pieces. Maybe the elm which has begun to die now similarly feels that it bears a lot of withered branches.” In ancient Macedonia, the birth of a child always begins with two poems that determine the childs fate. Then, the sorceress recited another poem. “ You who will stand on Gazibaba, my descendant hear me: from here I too have gazed on Skopje, it was a spring day, one of those when the fresh outlines of the roods are softly interwoven and every poplar is a green waterjet. My gaze is a little veiled (that’s why I’m silent) but clear sighted and bright. Know you: I feel that this call is the boldest grasp for the future, an embrace of your sould, I’d say, and cutting like a fresh-hones edge, dreaming, teeming, screaming: remember me!” So scared now, Vladja ran away home to her husband, only to tell them that their child was doomed to a life of sadness and uncertainty. While tempted to leave the child at birth, she loved the thought of having her own child. What the old sorceress did not tell Vladja that day, was that while Mykos was doomed to a life of sadness she would have one great love. This great love would be her own child.
So one day, Mykos who had a strange feeling on that particular hour went to another village sorceress who echoed to her a much different poem. She said sweetly, “ I was perhaps not quite twenty when I wrote: So much did woe cry out within me that I was born into a tribe in need. And to this day the injury will bleed. I’m haunted by that ever-present woe and one that’s greater still so that, sower of barren seed, I’ll say, to change the words a little, still does the woe cry out within me that I am horn into a tribe in need. And yet I hope this isn’t so, since I have undergone the test of such great woe.” That day, Mykos overjoyed with this news ran by the river in Skopje and gave birth to a little girl named Miklos. Little did Mykos know, Miklos meant “queen”, her true destiny all along.